#Ken Hitchcock

[artseventhart]

— Don't Worry Darling (2022), dirigida por Olivia Wilde. — Barbie (2023), dirigida por Greta Gerwig.

[old-wild-child]

If I had a nickel for every time I watched a movie where Anthony Perkins spies on through a peephole and then kills/tries to kill a blonde woman with the last name Crane by stabbing her repeatedly while he wears a dress, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that happened twice.

[badmovieihave]

Bad movie I have North by Northwest 1959

[notallsandmen]

The Honk Zone Presents: Absurdist Sandman AUs

Dreamling, but no one likes hair pulling or has a praise kink AU

Hob is just so so on living AU

Witchfinder General Hob AU

Dream, but when Hob calls him a friend he's just like "ok bestie" AU

Dream is a neurotypical extrovert AU

Dream does Eat Pray Love after Calliope divorces him AU

Commitmentphobe Orpheus AU

Incel Basement Dweller Orpheus AU

Death makes time for her siblings AU

True Crime Wine Mom Dream AU

Flat Earther Dream AU

Disney Live Action Sequel Enjoyer Dream AU

Agony Aunt Columnist Destiny AU

Live Laugh Love Author Despair AU

Couple’s Counselor Desire AU

Marie Kondo Organizer Delirium AU

Dreaming Union Leader Mervyn AU

Agoraphobic Destruction AU

Hitchcock’s The Birds (but it's all just Jessamy and Matthew) AU

Anger Management therapist Lyta Hall AU

The Corinthian Ken Barbie AU

Instagram Influencer John Dee AU

Destiny’s Wet Hot Summer AU

Made by myself and @chaosheadspace @ml-nolan @chaosclimber , @beatnikfreakiswriting

[barbielore]

After exploring the Mad Men tie-in dolls, and the Pussy Galore Barbie, I thought I’d put together a list of the character tie-in Barbies that I find the most unexpected or otherwise remarkable!

Dale Earnhardt Jr Barbie.

Note this is not just a NASCAR Barbie as it would appear at first glance - it is specifically Dale Earnhardt Jr branded and themed.

Alexis from Dynasty

It’s a very nice design, but much like the Mad Men tie-ins, I would not have thought of Dynasty as being a media property ripe for a Barbie tie-in.

Jacob from Twilight

Okay, okay, Twilight is definitely a good product for a tie-in. But the Jacob cracks me up. At least the other character Barbies get to wear clothes.

George Washington

What I love about the George Washington Barbie is that they went with Barbie, rather than a Ken.

Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds

This is from the same collection as the Pussy Galore, and I understand this even less.

[celepom]

Favourite Non-Fiction / Bio Graphic Novels of 2022

When I Grow Up: The Lost Autobiographies of Six Yiddish Teenagers by Ken Krimstein

When I Grow Up is New Yorker cartoonist Ken Krimstein’s new graphic nonfiction book, based on six of hundreds of newly discovered, never-before-published autobiographies of Eastern European Jewish teens on the brink of WWII��found in 2017 hidden in a Lithuanian church cellar. These autobiographies, long thought destroyed by the Nazis, were written as entries for three competitions held in Eastern Europe in the 1930s, just before the horror of the Holocaust forever altered the lives of the young people who wrote them. In When I Grow Up, Krimstein shows us the stories of these six young men and women in riveting, almost cinematic narratives, full of humor, yearning, ambition, and all the angst of the teenage years. It’s as if half a dozen new Anne Frank stories have suddenly come to light, framed by the dramatic story of the documents’ rediscovery. Beautifully illustrated, heart-wrenching, and bursting with life, When I Grow Up reveals how the tragedy that is about to befall these young people could easily happen again, to any of us, if we don’t learn to listen to the voices from the past.

Finding Joy by Gary Andrews

When his wife, Joy, died very suddenly, a daily drawing became the way Gary Andrews dealt with his grief. From learning how to juggle his kids' playdates and single-handedly organising Christmas, to getting used to the empty side of the bed, Gary's honest and often hilarious illustrations have touched the hearts of thousands on social media. Finding Joy is the story of how one family learned to live again after tragedy.

Flung Out of Space by Grace Ellis & Hannah Templer

A fictional and complex portrait of bestselling author Patricia Highsmith caught up in the longing that would inspire her queer classic,  The Price of Salt Flung Out of Space is both a love letter to the essential lesbian novel, The Price of Salt, and an examination of its notorious author, Patricia Highsmith. Veteran comics creators Grace Ellis and Hannah Templer have teamed up to tell this story through Highsmith’s eyes—reimagining the events that inspired her to write the story that would become a foundational piece of queer literature. Flung Out of Space opens with Pat begrudgingly writing low-brow comics. A drinker, a smoker, and a hater of life, Pat knows she can do better. Her brain churns with images of the great novel she could and should be writing—what will eventually be Strangers on a Train— which would later be adapted into a classic film by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951.   At the same time, Pat, a lesbian consumed with self-loathing, is in and out of conversion therapy, leaving a trail of sexual conquests and broken hearts in her wake. However, one of those very affairs and a chance encounter in a department store give Pat the idea for her soon-to-be beloved tale of homosexual love that was the first of its kind—it gave the lesbian protagonists a happy ending.   This is not just the story behind a classic queer book, but of a queer artist who was deeply flawed. It’s a comic about what it was like to write comics in the 1950s, but also about what it means to be a writer at any time in history, struggling to find your voice.     Author Grace Ellis contextualizes Patricia Highsmith as both an unintentional queer icon and a figure whose problematic views and noted anti-Semitism have cemented her controversial legacy. Highsmith’s life imitated her art with results as devastating as the plot twists that brought her fame and fortune.

My Brain is Different: Stories of ADHD and Other Developmental Disorders by MONNZUSU

In this manga essay anthology, follow the true stories of nine people (including the illustrator) navigating life with developmental disorders and disabilities. This intimate manga anthology is about the struggles and successes of individuals learning to navigate daily life with a developmental disorder. The comics follow the stories of nine people, including: a junior high dropout finding an alternate path to education; a former "troublesome" child helping kids at a support school; a so-called problem child realizing the beauty of his own unique quirks; and a man falling in love with the world with the help of a new medication. This book illustrates the anxieties and triumphs of people living in a world not quite built with them in mind.

Ten Days in a Mad-House by Brad Ricca, Courtney Sieh, Nellie Bly

Beautifully adapted and rendered through piercing illustrations by acclaimed creators Brad Ricca and Courtney Sieh, Nellie Bly’s complete, true-to-life 19th-century investigation of Blackwell Asylum captures a groundbreaking moment in history and reveals a haunting and timely glimpse at the starting point for conversations on mental health. “I said I could and I would. And I did.” While working for Joseph Pulitzer’s newspaper in 1887, Nellie Bly began an undercover investigation into the local Women’s Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell Island. Intent on seeing what life was like on the inside, Bly fooled trained physicians into thinking she was insane—a task too easily achieved—and had herself committed. In her ten days at the asylum, Bly witnessed horrifying conditions: the food was inedible, the women were forced into labor for the staff, the nurses and doctors were cruel or indifferent, and many of the women held there had no mental disorder of any kind. Now adapted into graphic novel form by Brad​ Ricca and vividly rendered with beautiful and haunting illustrations by Courtney Sieh, Bly’s bold venture is given new life and meaning. Her fearless investigation into the living conditions at the Blackwell Asylum forever changed the field of journalism. A timely reminder to take notice of forgotten populations, Ten Days in a Mad-House warns us what happens when we look away.

So Much for Love: How I Survived a Toxic Relationship by Sophie Lambda

Part memoir, part self-help book, So Much Bad For Love guides readers with honesty and humor through how to spot, cope with, and ultimately survive a romantic relationship with a malignant narcissist. Sophie had always been cynical about love—until she meets Marcus. His affection and doting praise melt away her defenses. The beginning of their relationship was a whirlwind romance, but over time she finds herself on uneven footing. Marcus lies. He's violently angry and bewilderingly inconsistent. Yet somehow he always manages to explain away his behavior and to convince Sophie that it's all in her head. Sophie comes to realize that she's become trapped in a cycle of abuse with someone with narcissistic personality disorder. Once she gets out of the relationship, Sophie documents the experience in this bracing, hilarious, and empathetic graphic novel that's full of advice to readers who may be in similar straits.

[kitsunetsuki]

Arnaud de Rosnay - Jane Hitchcock & Marisa Berenson Wearing Outfits by Ken Scott (Vogue 1968)

[woundthatswallows]

fave first watches from january 2024!

shadow of a doubt (1943) dir alfred hitchcock, houseboat (1958) dir melville shavelson, easy rider (1969) dir dennis hopper, the divorcee (1930), charade (1963) dir stanley donen, night tide (1961) dir curtis harrington, nightmare alley (1947) edmund goulding, the boy friend (1971) dir ken russell, roman holiday (1953) dir william wyler

[filmaticbby]

Aries: Tarantino, F. F. Coppola, Andrea Arnold, Eric Rohmer, Edgar Wright, Ruben Östlund, Josh Safdie, David Lean, Andrei Tarkovsky, Michael Haneke, Martin McDonagh

Taurus: Wes Anderson, Orson Welles, Sofia Coppola, Lars von Trier, Terry Zwigoff, George Lucas, Robert Zemeckis, John Waters, Frank Capra

Gemini: Fassbinder, Hideaki Anno, Makhmalbaf, Agnès Varda, Alex Garland, Clint Eastwood, Yorgos Lanthimos, Aaron Sorkin, Ken Loach, Alexander Sokurov, Giuseppe Tornatore

Cancer: Abbas Kiarostami, Wong Kar-wai, P. T. Anderson, Mike White, Ari Aster, Ingmar Bergman, Krzysztof Kieślowski, Paul Verhoeven, Robert Eggers, Béla Tarr, Mel Brooks, Ken Russell, Sidney Lumet, Kinji Fukasaku

Leo: Alfred Hitchcock, Greta Gerwig, Alain Robbe-grillet, Kubrick, Wes Craven, Taika Waititi, Luca Guadagnino, Christopher Nolan, Polanski, Sam Mendes, Richard Linklater, Nicolas Roeg, James Cameron, Pablo Larraín, M. Night Shyamalan, Iñárritu, Gus Van Sant, Peter Weir, Wim Wenders, Maurice Pialat

Virgo: Tom Ford, Joe Wright, Paul Feig, Dario Argento, David Fincher, Brian De Palma, Baz Luhrmann, Tim Burton, Friedkin, Takashe Miike, Noah Baumbach, Werner Herzog, Elia Kazan, E. Coen

Libra: Julie Dash, Almodóvar, Jacques Tati, Ang Lee, Michelangelo Antonioni, Ti West, Walerian Borowczyk, Nicolas Winding Refn, Satoshi Kon, Kenneth Lonergan, Michael Powell, Jacques Tati, Steve McQueen, Denis Villeneuve

Scorpio: Mike Nichols, Barry Jenkins, Charlie Kaufman, Céline Sciamma, Tsai Ming-liang, Jean Rollin, Scorsese, Louis Malle, Luchino Visconti, François Ozon, Julia Ducournau

Sagittarius: Sion Sono, Cassavetes, Raj Kapoor, Steven Spielberg, Eliza Hittman, Terrence Malick, Ozu, Alfonso Cuarón, Gregg Araki, Larry Charles, Judd Apatow, Kathryn Bigelow, Lenny Abrahamson, J. Coen, Jean Luc Godard, Diane Kurys, Ridley Scott, Lynne Ramsay, Woody Allen, Fritz Lang

Capricorn: Larry Clark, David Lynch, Harmony Korine, Damien Chazelle, David Lowery, Mary Harron, Sergio Leone, Todd Haynes, Pedro Costa, Gaspar, Noe, Fellini, Joseph Losey, Miyazaki, John Carpenter, Steven Soderbergh, Michael Curtiz, John Singleton, Vertov

Aquarius: Jim Jarmusch, John Hughes, Darren Aronofsky, Jodorowski, Michael Mann, Derek Cianfrance, Alex Payne, Truffau, Eisenstein, Tone Hooper

Pisces: Pasolini, Sean Baker, Paul Schrader, Bernardo Bertolucci, Benny Safdie, Jacques Rivette, Bunuel, Luc Besson, David Cronenberg, Spike Lee, Rob Reiner, Mike Mills, Sebastián Lelio, Jordan Peele, Ron Howard, Robert Altman

[artseventhart]

— 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), dirigida por Stanley Kubrick. — Barbie (2023), dirigida por Greta Gerwig.

[brokehorrorfan]

Blu-ray Review: Unlawful Entry

Box office draw is anything but predictable, but Hollywood sure likes to hedge its bets. From Scream's teen slasher revival to Paranormal Activity's found footage trend to Marvel's superhero craze, a novel concept that over-performs is almost guaranteed to yield similar projects until audiences tire of the fad. Fatal Attraction launched a cycle of racy thrillers in the early '90s that included the likes of Basic Instinct, Single White Female, The Hand that Rocks the Cradle, Sleeping with the Enemy, and Cape Fear.

While not as well remembered as the aforementioned efforts, Unlawful Entry remains an effective entry in the subgenre from journeyman director Jonathan Kaplan (The Accused, ER). Lewis Colick's (October Sky, Charlie St. Cloud) script may traverse familiar tropes, but Kurt Russell (The Thing), Ray Liotta (Goodfellas), and Madeleine Stowe (12 Monkeys) gracefully elevate the material with their performances.

Bookended by tense home invasion sequences, the 1992 film opens with a burglar breaking into the upscale home of recent Los Angeles transplants Michael (Russell) and Karen Carr (Stowe). Although ultimately unharmed, they're left shaken up by the ordeal after Michael is forced to watch helplessly as the assailant holds Karen at knifepoint. Responding officer Pete Davis (Liotta) goes out of his way to help them feel safer.

Pete presents himself as the sincere lawman at first, but it quickly becomes clear to both the viewer and Michael that he's unhinged. He grows increasingly obsessed with Karen, invading not only the couple's home but also their lives as he does everything in his considerable power to take Michael out of the picture. The third act is exactly the suspenseful thrill-ride you'd want from a movie of this ilk.

While a lesser film would pit Russell and Liotta against one another in a testosterone-fueled stand-off, Unlawful Entry takes a more interesting approach. Although their conflict is not without machismo, their personalities repel one another on a granular level. Beyond coveting his wife, Pete has no respect for Michael. In Pete's mind, he is the alpha male getting his hands dirty and protecting the streets, so he deserves Michael's prosperous life.

Liotta is effectively disarming at first before unraveling into a deranged stalker. Russell is as charming as ever, but he's not afraid to show vulnerability. Stowe brings a cleverness to the damsel in distress. The cast also includes Roger E. Mosley (Magnum P.I.) as Pete's level-headed partner, Ken Lerner (The Goldbergs) as Michael's lawyer, Dick Miller (Gremlins) as an impound clerk, and a young Djimon Hounsou (Guardians of the Galaxy) as a prisoner.

Unlawful Entry is now invading homes on Blu-ray via Scream Factory exclusively on ShoutFactory.com. While the company's limited releases are typically reserved for titles with a more narrow appeal, Unlawful Entry's allotment of 1,620 units sold out in a matter of days, prompting them to increase the run to 2,600 (which brings into question the point of limiting it in the first place, but I digress).

The film is presented in high definition from an existing transfer with 5.1 Surround DTS-HD Master Audio and 2.0 Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio options. The quality is aggressively fine; it certainly won't win any competitions against a modern 4K master, but it's a welcome improvement over the old DVD.

Despite its limited status, new special features were produced: a 28-minute interview Kaplan, who sets the stage by highlighting his genre-hopping career before focusing on Unlawful Entry; an interview with cinematographer Jamie Anderson (Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Small Soldiers); and an featurette in which music historian Daniel Schweiger breaks down the score by James Horner (Aliens, Avatar).

Archival special features include: a DVD commentary by Kaplan, who notes how he learned how to reflect the subjectivity of human experience in film by watching Alfred Hitchcock and details how the Rodney King riots impacted the movie; a vintage EPK-style featurette with snippets from Kaplan, Russell, Liotta, Stowe, and more; the theatrical trailer; and two TV spots.

In a time when police misconduct is caught on camera on a near-daily basis, Unlawful Entry is all the more relevant over 30 years removed from its original release. Coupled with a severely underrated performance from the late Liotta, the '90s thriller gem begging for rediscovery.

Unlawful Entry is available now on Blu-ray via Scream Factory.

[wilburwhateley]

Hooptober X

For those of you who use Letterboxd (or who just want something semi-structured to distract you for at least 31 days), Hooptober is on again--31 Horror movies in 31 days, initiated originally by Cinemonster. It is a challenge sort of deal, and I have transferred-over the list criteria from their updated post below. Click-into the link to Cinemonster's list description on Letterboxd to retrieve the Screambox link for a complimentary channel trial. I am starting early, as well, since I have a lot on my plate. Plus I get to start my Halloween celebration early. Again.

Here's the list:

"There must be 31 films 6 countries 8 decades 2 post apocalyptic or natural disaster related films

1 film with Robert Englund 1 something is underground film 3 Satan/Devil centered films 1 Amicus film. The worst Dracula film (by Letterboxd rating) that you haven't seen and can access. 1 LGBTQ+ connected film 5 Films from De Palma, Wes Craven, Ken Russell, Hitchcock and/or Moorehead & Benson. 2 Peter Cushing films 1 film based on a work of or invoking the name Bram Stoker 1 film based on a Clive Barker story 1 film that was released the year that you turned 10 1 Mario Bava film. 1 film with an 'x' in the title 

And 1 Tobe Hooper Film (There must ALWAYS be a Hooper film)

***FOR THOSE THAT LIKE TO DO EXTRA WORK: WATCH The Zodiac Killer and 10 Rillington Place. Like last year, there is a third film: Shaky Shivers."

[justforbooks]

“I hear you’re making a movie about a fish,” the cinematographer Bill Butler said to the young director Steven Spielberg when they bumped into each other on the Universal lot in 1974. Butler, then in his early 50s, had already shot two projects for Spielberg – the TV movie Something Evil (1972) and Savage (1973), a pilot that was not taken up as a series. But it was their collaboration on the “fish movie” that cemented their reputations.

Summer was not previously regarded as an optimum time to release a big studio picture, which is why Jaws (1975), which flooded screens across the US rather than trickling out in stages, is considered the first summer blockbuster – though its finesse and skill, not to mention an intimate second half in which the cast dwindles to three men and a largely unseen shark, give it little in common with the sort of crash-bang-wallop productions that followed in its wake.

It remains one of the finest slow-burning suspense movies outside Hitchcock in his heyday, due in no small part to the cinematography by Butler, who has died aged 101. The production was besieged with difficulties but in 2003 Spielberg called him “the calm before, during and after every storm on the set of Jaws”.

Butler shot about 90% of the ocean scenes with a handheld Panaflex camera for greater flexibility and immediacy. Borrowing a trick he had picked up while shooting second unit on the thriller Deliverance (1972), he also made a transparent box into which the camera was placed to allow for shooting at water level. The effect, he explained, was dramatic and instantaneous. “The big advantage is that psychologically you’re asking: ‘What’s right below the water? Is that shark right there?’” Shots of the thrashing legs of oblivious swimmers “made the audience think: ‘That must look good to a shark. It looks like dinner time.’”

Jaws was one of two best picture Oscar nominees that year in which Butler had a hand, the other being Miloš Forman’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, the eventual winner, based on Ken Kesey’s novel about patients in a psychiatric hospital. Butler was Oscar-nominated for Forman’s film along with Haskell Wexler, who had shot the lion’s share of the footage before being sacked. It was a stormy set, with the actor Jack Nicholson refusing to speak to the director and communicating instead with Wexler and then Butler, who reportedly shot everything from the climactic party scene onwards. A year earlier he had replaced Wexler on Francis Ford Coppola’s brooding surveillance thriller The Conversation (1974).

After Jaws, Butler’s biggest commercial successes were the musical Grease (1978) as well as three consecutive sequels to Sylvester Stallone’s 1976 boxing drama Rocky, beginning with Rocky II (1979). Butler brought a special vitality to the fight scenes in the series, occasionally shooting with as many as eight cameras simultaneously. “As carefully as we planned, there were times when we expected to pan left and something unexpected happened, and we needed to go to the right or zoom instead,” he said. “When an actor slipped, we caught the expression of surprise on his face.”

Some projects even he couldn’t save. Can’t Stop the Music (1980), a vehicle for the disco group the Village People, was a flop that later acquired a cult following. That honour eluded another musical, Graffiti Bridge (1990), starring and directed by Prince. It was shot by Butler, once again serving as an 11th-hour replacement, at the singer’s Paisley Park studios near Minneapolis.

Butler was born in Cripple Creek, Colorado, to Wilmer, a farmer, and Verca, a psychiatric nurse. The family moved to Henry county, Georgia, when he was five, then on to Mount Pleasant, Iowa. He was educated at Mount Pleasant high school and received a degree in engineering from the University of Iowa, where he became fascinated with cameras. He worked for four years as a radio station engineer while also setting up a television station that was later sold to ABC.

Next he got a job at the Chicago-based WGN-TV, where he met the director William Friedkin. Their documentary The People Vs Paul Crump (1962), about an African American man on death row, was screened for Otto Kerner, the governor of Illinois, in rough-cut form the night before Crump was due to be executed. Examining the evidence presented in the film, Kerner changed the sentence to life without parole. “I remember thinking: ‘My God, film has this kind of power?’” said Butler. “That little 16mm film saved someone’s life.”

For Philip Kaufman, Butler shot Fearless Frank (1967), starring Jon Voight as a man who is killed then resurrected as a superhero crime-fighter. He collaborated for the first time with Coppola on the director’s road movie The Rain People (1969), then shot Nicholson’s directorial debut, Drive, He Said (1971).

Among his later credits are the baseball comedy-drama The Bingo Long Travelling All-Stars & Motor Kings, the rape revenge thriller Lipstick (both 1976), Demon Seed, in which Julie Christie is impregnated by a malevolent computer, the conspiracy thriller Capricorn One (both 1977), the horror sequel Damien: Omen II (1978) and two military comedies, Stripes (1981) and Biloxi Blues (1988).

Butler was lauded for his television work: he won an Emmy each for Raid on Entebbe (1976), based on a real-life hostage rescue mission in Uganda, and an adaptation of A Streetcar Named Desire (1984) starring Ann-Margret as Blanche DuBois. He was nominated for another for shooting the steamy mini-series The Thorn Birds (1983).

In 1997 he shot a pair of films that echoed his past glories: the monster movie Anaconda owed more than a little to Jaws, while Don King: Only in America, made for TV, utilised his expertise in rendering ring-craft. For the latter, Butler built a box camera that the actor Danny Johnson, who played the world heavyweight champion Larry Holmes, could physically attack. Johnson “pulverised the lens”, said the director, John Herzfeld. “He literally beat it to shit. You’re completely in a subjective point of view.”

Butler maintained that the 1970s were the “perfect time” for him to make his name. “It was a merging of a lot of film styles that up until then had been very staid, very straightforward. There were certain rules you didn’t break, except I was one of those people that came to break all the rules.”

He is survived by his second wife, Iris (nee Schwimmer), their children, Genevieve and Chelsea, and three daughters, Judy, Patricia and Pam, from his first marriage, to Alma (nee Smith), which ended in divorce in 1983.

🔔 Wilmer Cable Butler, cinematographer, born 7 April 1921; died 5 April 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[nizynskis]

12 and 21!!

PLUTO HII ok let me go find the asks

‘a film whose main genre is horror/thriller’ Psycho 1960 by Alfred Hitchcock i remembered it lately bc alan is posting the franchise and i loveddddd it anthony perkins is so beautiful i loved the scene where he said Im Psycho and jeff the killer everyone

‘ a film with a great soundtrack/score’ The Boy Friend 1971 by Ken Russell it’s a 20s themed musical and the story of the movie is interwoven with the story they’re performing as vaudeville dancers it’s so very entertaining and there are clowns

[barbielore]

What’s the weirdest Barbie ever made to your knowledge?

You would not believe how broad a question that is. Over the years there have been a great deal of Barbies and some of them are real specific.

My go to example is usually Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds Barbie.

Horror movie from 1963 isn’t really my first thought when I think of the Barbie line.

Shaving Fun Ken was also pretty weird. I don’t know why Mattel thought kids wanted to shave an adult man. I mean, maybe some kids did. Especially since they did it again with Cool Shaving Ken, so he must have had a target audience. It escapes me, though.

[waspabi]

More Like War Ch. 2

(C.K. Dexter Haven voice) Hello friends and enemies. It’s been a while!

Since this has been a pretty Sema-centric chapter:

Alexander Semin knowing exactly what he is doing to Nicklas Bäckström

Mike Green, service dog in the Alexander Semin cheetah enclosure

Alexander Semin dealing with complex pyschosexual feelings about Alex Ovechkin

Boudreau

Listen. I actually really like Boudreau and think he's a good coach but man has writing this chapter reminded me of my Many Grudges Against Him. Every media quote was an actual quote, with only one having been padded a little. 

Boudreau’s wildly Canadian Hockey Man quote about Nicke’s “toughness”: 

“There’s something that’s ingrained in him,” Boudreau said. “You don’t think of it with Nick because he’s a blond, blue-eyed, Swedish, good-looking young man. But he’s got a toughness that belies all that, a toughness that coaches just love. He’s not going to fight, but he’s tough. I saw him last year where he could barely walk, but he was playing.”

The Red Wings game with the five penalties where only Sema was lambasted? 100% accurate!

Perhaps the best example came in a 3-2 loss to New Jersey at Verizon Center on Nov. 4, when Semin took three offensive-zone penalties, including one for hooking that led to a Devils goal. Afterward, Coach Bruce Boudreau was blunt in saying, "Alexander Semin has been in the league for five years and it’s just dumb penalties.”

Several days later, this reveal:

It’s believed that Semin has been playing through a litany of injuries, which might have something to do with his recent decline in production. He has not recorded a point in three straight games and has not scored a goal in six.

No points in three straight games! Can you imagine. I mean in 08-09 he did very much score at a 1.27 PPG pace (79 points in 62 games) so fair enough!

That CBJ Game

Earlier this week, Coach Bruce Boudreau said he believed the Blue Jackets planned to target Ovechkin by hitting the all-star every time he touched the puck. Columbus Coach Ken Hitchcock confirmed Tuesday that it was indeed his team’s strategy. “Run, chase, hunt down, hit, whatever word you want to use, that would be correct,” Hitchcock told reporters in Columbus. “He’s a very unique player because he gives it and he takes it. He doesn’t whine or cry about getting hit. He has fun in that role because the more you give it to him, the more he gives it back.”

Brooks Laich

Brooks Laich just absolutely could NOT stop hitting it out of the park with horny quotes about Alexander Semin:

It’s almost like God touched him on the shoulder and said, ‘You are wonderfully gifted’.” 

The other part of that quote was taken from Olaf Kolzig. 

“When you see a kid who has more talent than the reigning MVP, you want to see more,” Kolzig says of the 13th player taken in the 2002 draft. “He’s teasing you. The frustrating thing is he hasn’t gotten everything out of his talent. He doesn’t have the intangibles Ovie has. With Ovie there’s accountability. He’s had a bad groin and played through it. Ovie realizes what he has to live up to. So far [Semin] just puts up points.”

Misc.

Sema's weight and body composition played a big role in his injuries. He was hilariously infamous for never doing anything but cardio in the weight room. His weight in the press around this time was something like 209 lbs, but bless him he punctured that illusion real quick in this Russian interview from 2009:

Pretty sure he was, in fact, threatened to gain weight but you ever try to get a cat to do anything?

Cameos in this chapter from...

Nicklas Lidström, the quote unquote "Perfect Human"

Nicke has said he's the toughest defenseman he's ever played against.

Slava Kozlov, an all time pain in the ass (affectionate) whose Red Wings nickname was Grump

(bottom left, with Sergei Fedorov (center) and several of my all time faves)

Dainius Zubrus, who does indeed Look Like That:

He's actually Lithuanian but he did speak Russian and translated for Ovi and Sema in the early years.

And finally, Sema's mouth thing he simply loved to do on the bench, uhhh NSFW!!